


We're not friends

by Veelitann



Series: The Count [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: A little angst, Canon, Comfort, Fluff, Insecure Keith (Voltron), M/M, gentle touching, hug, kangst, keith - Freeform, kiss, lance - Freeform, soft pinning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-12-01 20:33:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11494227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veelitann/pseuds/Veelitann
Summary: They were so different.Lance McCain didn't appreciate Keith since the beginning. At all.And it was as unbearable as a blessing.So...Why?Why was he asking such a thing?





	We're not friends

**Author's Note:**

> Here I am, back with some soft Voltron <3  
> Just needed to write something sweet, and I have to admit that if I already had a thing for insecure Lance-- OMG I also loveso much an insecure Keith! Must write soon about it again! *wink wink* 
> 
> So well, feel free to leave a comment, I'd love reading you here <3 
> 
> Also you can find me @dahcyst on Twitter and Tumblr ! <3

"So? Eh, answer me, at least!" 

"Honestly, I--" 

Under Lance's gaze, Keith didn't know how to feel. For the last year, everything had been new. everything had been going too fast for his liking. When Shiro had appeared between the army's hands, he had really though that everything woud be back to the normal. A normal life, with the man, like _before_. 

He never expected other peope to be involved in it. He didn't actually think that they'd really get themselves in such a situation, lost somewhere in the space with only two aliens to lead them all. He never thought of being part of that intergalactic space opera, let alone pilot a fucking...Cat-robot? He still wasn't sure about anything yet by now. 

But what's more, he didn't expect to be...Not alone. At least physically. If he had been used to Shiro's presence for years before the Kerberos attack, he'd never really been into socializing with others. And others had never really wanted him to, actually. 

He didn't need people to come by him. He didn't need to talk to anyone, and Shiro had been the only one to deal with him and his personnality, his fears, his way to see the world. 

And now? Now, he was stuck with those six people in that huge castle. It was easy to hide alone in a room, no matter wich one, it was easy to forget himself in some hard training, it was easy not to think anymore about all of that for a few hours under the pain of a bad kick. 

It was hard to live amongst people who disliked you that much. 

So he thought. 

"You could finish your sentence, at least." 

Lance's tone was something that Keith couldn't define easily. The young man had always been the worst toward him and Keith had always taken that fact gladly. So, _why_? 

Lance McCain was a dick, and it was all Keith had always tried to get in mind. Sometimes, it was hard. Denying what he knew about the Cuban was too difficult. He couldn't just forget and go away past his memories of soft sobbing through the thick door of his room. He couldn't forget the red eyes in the morning despite that terrible smile decorating his face from one ear to another. 

But Keith also couldn't act like he knew. He didn't know, couldn't understand a single thing of all this. They were so different, Lance was so attached to his planet, to his family, to his friend, to _his life_. Keith, on his side, didn't mind so much. He didn't have any family appart from Shiro who wasn't even blood related. He'd already left everything when the man had disappeared and, really, nothing could make him regret what he'd done until now. 

Really. 

They were so different.

Lance McCain didn't appreciate Keith since the beginning. At all. 

_And it was as unbearable as a blessing._

So...Why?

Why asking such a thing? 

"Keith, I don't mind if you reject it, but could you speak, at least?" 

Keith looked away at that. Of course, he could. How was his silence taken, after all? Would Lance yell after him for not answering the right way? 

_Would he hate him even more?_

"I'm not...Just, I'm not sure about...What you want from me..." 

"Uh?" 

Keith shifted a little on his place. Against his back, the wall of the corridor was cold and Lance's hand, near his head and flat on the said wall, almost brushed his cheek when Keith moved. It stopped him right away, his heart missing a beat. 

"I've been rather clear about it, I think?" Lance sighed a little and Keith didn't miss the way his slender body was leaning even more on him. 

Lance McClain had to hate him. 

"Keith," Lance startd again, and this time his other hand mirrored the first one on the other side of Keith's head. Oh, did he feel trapped. "There's something with you." 

"Me?" 

Lance's blue eyes looked away from his comrade as he kept talking. "You always act as if you didn't need anyone." 

"I don't need anyone," Keith repeated, quite confirming it. Or rather, he was trying. 

"Even Shiro?" 

"That's different!" 

Lance huffed gently with a sad smirk and Keith bit his tongue. 

" _Even me?_ " 

The corridor was silent. Lance had lowered his voice, and Keith had to focus on his face to mostly get his words from the shape of his mouth. Lance looked down their feet with a new sigh. 

"I'll repeat it, Keith. I don't mind if you don't answer right now, but say something, okay?" 

Keith closed his eyes. Staring at Lance had never done any good to him. It had always been a difficult feeling that had to fill his mind and make his stomach twitch painfully. Lance's gaze wasn't something as joyful as everyone had always thought. His eyebrows were often knitted together in a thin line full of worries, his features showing every of his questions. It was the Lance that was hidden most of the time, the Lance that Keith didn't want to acknowledge about, the one he always found alone in a corridor or in the middle of the training room, alone. 

Every time Lance knew that someone was present, that strange face of his immediatly changed for the one they were all used to. 

That amazing _and false_ grin of his. 

"You...Shit, I don't know how to say it now, that's your fault, mullet..." 

Keith watched closely Lance's throat move slightely, the way he was swallowing his saliva, the way he was frowning, the line of his nose pleating softly. 

"I mean...How could I ask you differently...To be...Something more...?" 

Keith frowned a little at it. "We're not friends," he said, blunt and somehow bitter as the idea hit him. 

"We're not friends?" Lance repeated and he blinked with some surprise. "Wait, you..." 

"I don't even understand why you ask _me_ about that," Keith cut him. "Why? You'd rather hate me instead, you--"

"Hate you?" Lance opened big, wide eyes. "Well, you still have that awful mullet even if your hair grew quite a lot, but that doesn't mean I hate you..." 

Keith was loosing it. He didn't get anything of all this. The meaning of things, what Lance really wanted. 

"Keith, do you hate me that much?" 

Having Lance questioning him back made Keith jump a little. "N-no!" 

"So, why do you think we're not _friends_ already?" 

At that, Keith bowed his head a little. He couldn't keep looking at Lance in this situation. He couldn't keep talking. 

He couldn't answer him. Might it be before or now, he could have never answer anyone about it. Every time he'd tried to think about it, his heart hammered, hard and painful. 

He'd always known that he was different. On earth as a child, at the garrison as a pilot, even here as a member of the team. He was different and perfectly knew it, and the acknowledge was something that made you lonely most of the time. No matter how many people could walk by your side; in the end, you'd always be alone. 

Keith knew it by heart. 

"Keith...?" 

"I..." 

_Mates_ were already a lot to him. Calling someone a _friend_ wasn't something he'd casually do, and for this again he felt so much different. 

Mates could leave you, you wouldn't be affected, right? It would only be _"life going on"_. 

Friends woul betray you and leave you in the worst position at the worst moment, destroy your life and your self esteem. 

"Your face is...Eh, don't think so hard, ok?" Lance murmured. 

"I don't think so hard," Keith hissed, more like a habit with Lance than anything else but it made the brunette smile gently. 

"Then, can we be...Something...? If we're...Not friends...?" Lance tried again, a bit differently this time. 

"I'm not even sure of what you want," Keith snorted. 

"To be more than just Blue for you." 

Lance's face slightly changed again as Keith remained silent once more. But it wasn't that sad and worried looks, just something else, a concerned expression and suddenly a warm hand was cupping Keith's face without a warning. It wasn't a quick gesture though -Keith could have avoid it by himself if he'd wanted to. But his mind wasn't at it . Like...At all. 

"Keith, what is it?" 

Keith had noticed it; Lance's body was pushing on his, pinning him gently against the wall. If he wanted, he only had to focus a few seconds to hear his heart beating hard in his chest like a damned. 

"You never miss an occasion to make a comment on me, why don't you say anything? What's with that face?" 

Keith wasn't sure what he had to do or say; he didn't answer, once more, and just rose a hand up, circling Lance's wrist. 

"Hey, Keith...Look at me?" 

"No." 

"Shitty Mullet," Lance sighed. "What's wrong with you?" 

Keith opened his mouth, closed it. There was nothing to say. It was just the normal way for things to go. 

But...

Lance's weight on him wasn't something normal to him. His proximity too. And somehow, it was as breathtaking as scary. 

How should he take it? What should he really answer to all that? 

"Tell me...Keith...?"

Lance's voice was just the smoothest thing Keith had ever heard. It wasn't the first time, of course, that he thought this way. Lance, _after Shiro_ , was probably the softest boy he'd ever met. Someone he would never want to leave behind. 

Lance leaned a little more on him, cheek suddenly brushing his, lips against his ear. 

"Keith..." 

His name echoed in his own ear, making Keith shiver despite his own will. 

"Why...?" Keith finally managed to ask. 

"Mh?" 

"You don't need me." 

Stating about Lance was something he hated, but he knew that he wuld have said the same to anyone. They didn't need him. They had never needed him, after all. A paladin was easily replaceable, they'd learnt it with Shiro's second disapearance. 

There was an awkward silence, and Lance abruptly closed his arms around Keith's shoulders, his fingers digging hard in the fabric of his jacket. It was a so tight embrace that Keith wondered for a second if the young man was trying to suffocate him or something. 

"Oh my god," Lance breathed. 

"Uh?" 

"Keith..." 

"Could you stop saying my name all the time? That's...Disturbing, really..." 

"What's disturbing?" 

Lance sighed a little against his ear. "Keith..." 

Keith _shivered_. 

"I...I told you..." 

"Is that how you see others? Us? _Me_?" Lance suddenly murmured, his low voice cutting Keith. 

"I didn't..." 

"People who only _need_ others?" 

_That's what people do_ , Keith wanted to say, but the words stayed stuck in his throat and he just found himself whining pathetically in Lance's arms. 

"Guess I understand a little better why you're like that, uh?" 

"L-Lance, that's not...That's, uh..." 

Keith felt long fingers running in the back of his head, playing gently with his hair and a shiver ran along his spine at the soft gesture. 

Even Shiro didn't use to have that type of proximity. He never dared touch him like that. Like they were that close. 

In the end, they only were two people sharing a part of life. _He knew it for years_. 

Keith had always felt that alone, close and far at the same time from everything around him. From everyone. 

"Keith, I don't need you," Lance said abruptly. 

Keith swallowed hard on his saliva and clenched a fist, shoving it deep in the pocket of his trousers. 

"I know, you--"

" _I want you_ , that's the difference! Keith, for God's sake, _why_? Why are you always like that...? Seriously, you scare the shit out of me when--" 

Keith exhaled softly. Of course he was scary. None of them had really accepted his nature, the violence of who and what he was in reality. 

"--when you cry like that...!" 

His fingers relaxed instantly in his pocket. Concentrated on the situation, on Lance, on the hand on his cheek, on Lance's voice in his ear, he hadn't noticed himself how tensed he was, how stressed, how _bad_ , how his nerves were giving up, slowly, day after day, hours after hours, minutes after minutes. 

The embrace got tighter, and this time Lance's face found its place in Keith's neck, rubbing softly his nose to push the collar. 

"Don't say it anymore," he murmured. "Don't say that I don't need you." 

Keith sniffed a little -and there, he realized that yeah, he'd probably been crying for a while now but couldn't get since when. 

"But you said--"

"I don't need you for something in particular, stupid mullet! I need you like I need to breath, and I want you like I--Uh, nevermind, I want you, that's all I can say...?" 

Lance suddenly shut and Keith felt him move a little against him. The wall in his back was hard and uncumfortable. The brunette's face came back in his vision and somehow Keith knew that something unusual was happening. 

Well. It was already the case for long, right? 

He would lie if he said that his heart wasn't beating with a certain joy. But to be honest...

"I'm scared." 

Lance blinked a little at first when the words shily left Keith mouth. "Of course, you're scared. I almost can hear your heart, dude." 

Keith winced at that. "I'm not into...Well, you know..." 

Lance raised an eyebrow and immediatly took his arms and hands off Keith, putting them up in a big and quick gesture. "Ah--aaaaaah, y-yeah, not into guys, yeah, oh my god, you're right, you--" 

But Keith caught them right away before even thinking about it. "--not into people..."

"Oh..." 

"But..." 

Keith pulled a little on Lance's arms, trying to get him close again. What was he doing, really? He'd always worked so his heart wouldn't do anything that his reason wouldn't approve and--

"You're not like... _People_...Right?" he breathed, unsure. 

So...Maybe? Maybe he could try and listen to his heart, to the tiny desire of being like anybody without thinking twice if people were going to leave him without a word, _again_. 

This time, Lance seemed to understand. His face softened and if he got out of Keith's hands, it was to be back on him, both hands cupping his face. 

"I'm not _people_ , Keith. I'm Lance." 

"Isn't that even worse?" Keith whined. 

"Being sarcastic?" 

"You--"

But Keith couldn't say more. Not with Lance's lips on his, in a soft and chast kiss. When he broke the contact to get not even an inch away from Keith's face, his breath felt incredibly hot and trembling. On his skin, Keith noticed the soft shaking of Lance's hands. 

Lance was the softest thing that could have happened to him. Ever. He felt it when Lance's lips slipped in his palm -when had Lance caught his hand by the way? Was that guy a magician at flirting with him? 

"I promise you that one day...One day you'll trust me enough...And...You won't be scared..Not anymore..."


End file.
